Life in the Cage with Lucifer and Michael
by psychoticpsychic
Summary: One-shot. Sam in Hell after S5 finale. The pain, the torture, the remorse.


**AN: Hello…This is my first Fanfic…And I just watched the S5 finale last night and got inspired to write this. The soldier reference is to the toy soldier Sam jams in the car and he sees again while punching Dean as Lucifer. Oh and, I don't own Supernatural or any of the characters in it. (I'm not saying I wouldn't like to. Are you hearing me, Kripke?)**

Sam closed his eyes and took a deep breath. So this is what it all came down to. All these years of saving people, hunting things- _the family business_' and this is what it all came down to. Here he was, Sam Winchester, possessed by the Devil, about to jump into the Cage. He knew Dean was right in front of him, beaten and bloody; he knew Cass was dead; he had felt Lucifer snap Bobby's neck; he was mildly aware of Michael, wearing Adam's meatsuit, coming to stop him- but none of that mattered. He had started this whole mess, endangering the whole damn planet, and he had to be the one to clean it up.

So, Michael following him, he jumped. Away from light, away from life. Into the dark, fiery pit that was Hell.

_****_

Burning. Sam was burning. The pain was so intense, he didn't even remember who he was. Where was he? Why was he here? What were they doing to him? It was was like he was lost in a darkness that ate away at him, consuming him. And yet, it never finished consuming him. It just went on and on. It was like the darkness was so thick and heavy, it was choking him. But he never ran out of breath and died. It was like drowning, that dreadful feeling of your life being squeezed away from you, but never reaching the bottom. It was like fighting in a war, being shot again and again, like a soldier who never died.

Soldier. _Soldier._

And it all flooded back to him. Every memory he ever cherished, the faces of everyone he ever loved, everyone who died because of him- starting from his mom, Jess, Ellen and Joe, Castiel, Bobby and countless other faces of people he could have saved. He remembered everything. _Everything. _It must have taken forever, and he knew it would, but Sam relived every single memory he ever had. The memories just made it worse. He was Sam Winchester, and he deserved to be here.

"Wise thinking, Sammy."

_Him. _The Devil. Was he still inside Sam?

"Oh, no I'm outside your melon. But you have to remember, _I am _the Devil. I can see right through you." And he did something. Something bad. Every particle of Sam was screaming out in agony. He wished he would just drop dead there.

"That's for stopping the Apocalypse, you _insignificant. Little. Brat_." Lucifer punctuated each word with a doubling of the pain. Just when Sam had thought that there couldn't possibly anymore pain, he doubled it. And it was clear that he had no intentions of stopping.

"You know, I'm not even doing anything and here you are, wishing you'd not carried out this stupid little plan of yours. Screw the rest of the world, right Sammy? And you should have just let me fight Michael and get done with it."

Sam wanted to hurl insults back at him. Scream back, until his throat no longer existed, but the agony was so extreme, he couldn't even think straight. He couldn't even see anything except a blinding white light. It was so bright, it was almost _dark. _He felt like his eyes were being poked on red, hot pincers.

"Ah, so you can see us. Me and my big brother, being ourselves," saying so, Lucifer did something again. "Don't worry, I'm just turning up the heat."

Sam could almost _feel _his skin melting away. It was like he was the sun. And he was so thirsty. He could smell it, demon blood, somewhere right above his mouth. But he couldn't reach it. He never would. He wondered if this was what Dean had been through.

"No dear, you're in _my _house. I have better services here," said the Devil.

"Lucifer, don't you think it's getting a little too hot in here?" Another voice. Michael, no doubt. Then Sam heard an almost inaudible whimper. Adam? Could it be? Then the sound kept getting louder. Louder and louder until it morphed into Jessica's ear-piercing scream. Her last one, her dying one. Sam felt like his head was being blasted to tiny ant-sized pieces.

Ants. Now he felt like each part of his body was being devoured by tiny, life-sucking ants. Each bite, multiplying the original pain by a million times. Compared to this, Jess' screaming was pleasant elevator music. And suddenly, the temperature dropped. Dropped, as in, a sudden plunge to temperatures worse than that of the freezing waters of the Antarctic. And still dropping. Sam felt like every part of his body was falling off, cell by frozen cell.

"There, is that better?" asked Lucifer, in a cruel, mocking tone. And then he began to sing. Some song in Enochian about a goat that sold its beard to a demon. Sam didn't know how he understood what the Devil was singing, but he began to laugh. He just kept laughing and laughing like a madman, unable to stop. And laughing _hurt._ It was like someone had clasped an iron cuff around his chest and kept tightening it. Just kept on tightening it, never stopping.

Sam wondered how long he'd been there. Each of the Devil's punishments seemed to last a century. He began to wish he hadn't made Dean promise not to try and get him out. But the rational, and barely existent part of him, disagreed. _No, Dean deserves to live a normal life._

_But do I really deserve this?_

_You have to pay for your actions._

_Surely not so much._

So now he was reduced to arguing with himself. Like he was two people. Like he had lost his mind. Maybe if he _did_ lose his mind, he wouldn't have to bear this. The liquid darkness was still there, the blinding light was still there, the skin-melting heat was still there, Jess' screaming was still there, the ants were still there, the freezing cold was still there, the cuff around his chest was still there. All this seemed to stretch on forever, like a never-ending river, one which flowed and flowed but never reached the ocean. Sam wondered how one could feel so much at the same time.

"Perks of living with me," replied the Devil, answering his thoughts.

How long had he been here? _How long?_

"Feeling unwelcome already? You've just been here five minutes….."

**AN- If you read till here, thumbs up to you! Please review. More review, more I'll write. I'm even planning a Teenchesters one.**


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